Kurt Groetsch @ OldTasty.com

Walking to work this morning, some guy sidled up behind me and started opening the pockets on my backpack. I didn’t even notice until I felt a tug on my bag and took a quick glance back — when I did, he moved off to my left and started walking a little ahead of me. I stayed with him the whole time, staring at him to see if I could get a reaction or even acknowledgement. (I knew he was guilty when he wouldn’t look at me. Everyone looks at me here.) When he finally stopped at a bus stop, I swung the bag around and, what do you know, two pockets had been unzipped. After checking to make sure he hadn’t gotten anything, I went back and confronted him, yelled for a while, called him an a**hole, drew a crowd and finally walked away.

I’ve mentioned before that the Beijing North train station is a couple of blocks off the path I take to work, so the area tends to attract transients from the countryside and the ragtag crew that accompanies them — beggars and peddlers mostly. Guess I can add “thieves” to that list now.

This is the second time I’ve been a victim of crime living in Beijing. Anyone remember the first?